To Kill A Mockingbird: Chapter 8


Plot Summary


This winter, Maycomb County experience their coldest weather since 1885 and Mrs. Radley passes away. Atticus returns from The Radley Place but doesn't tell Scout or Jem anything interesting. He says he didn't see Mr. Arthur and that Mrs. Radley died of natural causes. Jem and Scout discovers snow, and they build snowman, which Jem is very skillful at and since there was not enough snow they built the figure out of dirt and covered it with snow. Unintentionally, the snowman looks like Mr. Avery, an unhappy man that lives just down the street, so Atticus forced them to put a disguise so that Mr. Avery will not be upset. That night Mrs. Maudie's house lights on fire. Atticus orders Jem and Scout to stay in front of The Radley Place while he, the rest of the neighbors and firemen attempt to put the fire out. At dawn, they finally succeed and the fire does not spread to the other houses in that neighborhood, but Mrs. Maudie's house is destroyed. When they arrive home, Scout, Jem, and Atticus realize that Scout is wearing a blanket that isnt their property around her shoulder. Jem suspects that Boo Radley put it around her shouder when she was busy watching the fire since they were standing in front of the Radley's house. They all imagine what might have happened if she had turned around and Scout herself felt like she was about to throw up. The next day, Jem and Scout does not go to school as they did not get enough sleep. Surprisingly, Mrs. Maudie is not upset that her house got burned down because now she can rebuild it and have a smaller house but bigger garden for her azaleas. She reveals that the fire might have been caused by the fire she kept in the kitchen to keep her azaleas warm.

Character Profiles:
-Scout (Jean Louise Finch): A young girl and the protagonist of this book. Scout is still growing up and although there is much to learn, she has matured well for her age. During the fire, Scout was deeply shocked and didn't realize a stranger placing a blanket on her shoulders.
-Jem Finch: A young boy developing to become a teenager. Jem is a mature young boy who is beginning to think just like his father and who takes good care of his younger sister, Scout. Jem is not afraid to express or to say what's on his mind and doesn't care if somebody does not agree with him.
-Atticus Finch: The father of Scout, Atticus is a lawyer and a single parent who has raised his kids mostly by himself. He is a fair man who believes everybody is equal and helped put out the fire in Miss Maudie's house.
-Miss Maudie: A neighbor of the Finch's who grows azaleas in the backyard of her house. Miss Maudie's house was on fire one night and her whole house was destroyed the next morning. Surprisingly, Miss Maudie was happy that it was destroyed because now she can rebuild it just the way she wants to.
-Boo Radley: A mysterious man who is claimed to be a psychopath and has not shown his face around the neighborhood for over 20 years. He is believed to be the man who put the blanket on Scouts shoulder in order to keep her from the cold.

Setting, Background, Historical Items


It snowed in Maycomb County while they experienced their coldest weather since 1885.
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Character profile


Mr Avery is a old man with a pink face, and a big stomach below his belt. He said it was written on the Rosetta Stone that when children misbehave, seasons change, so he blames Scout, and Jem or the weather. When he realizes that the snowman Scout, and Jem builds is a characture of himself, he turns white. And he will be in bed for a week because he fell into Ms. Maudie's shrubbery while trying to help taking out her furniture during the fire.

Eula May is the lady who is Maycomb's leading telephone operator. She is entrusted with issuing public announcements, wedding invittions, setting off the fire siren, and giving first-aid instructions when Dr. Reynolds was away. In this chapter, she announces that as it has not snowed in Maycomb County since 1885, there will be no school today, and she sets off the fire siren.

Photo Bank


Rosetta Stone.
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Cannas.
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Snowing in Maycomb County.
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Azaleas.
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Burlap bag
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Scout and Jem's snowman, a characteture of Mr. Avery.
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Ms. Maudie's house on fire.
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Vocabulary

1. Rosetta Stone: a part of an inscribed granite stela that was originally about six feet tall and was set up in 196 BC; the inscriptions in hieroglyphics and Demotic and Greek gave the first clues to the decipherment of Egyptian hieroglyphics.
2. Appomattox: an opera in English based on the American Civil War, composed by Philip Glass, with a libretto by the playwright Christopher Hampton.
3. Adjacent: next to; adjoining
4. Perplexity: trouble or confusion resulting from complexity
5. Morphodite: Scout hears Miss Maudie call her and Jem's snowman a "morphodite". Miss Maudie most likely said "hermaphrodite", which is an animal or plant with both male and female reproductive organs.